12/23/24
November 11, 2003
Every Monday night, I ponder the eternal question;: what's up with this guy?
[more inside...]
posted by forksclovetofu to football at 03:58 PM - 17 comments
As a brief aside, I'm buddies with the guy who replaced Madden as the Rent-A-Center mascot. Good luck Adam! You've got big shoes to fill! And a big shirt. And big pants...
posted by forksclovetofu at 04:09 PM on November 11, 2003
too...many...links.
posted by jerseygirl at 04:24 PM on November 11, 2003
jerseygirl: Indulge! Explore! Let your inner clicker be your guide!
posted by forksclovetofu at 04:28 PM on November 11, 2003
Nice post. I guess I'm in the minority: Madden does a lot of clowning around, but I still think that if you know football, he brings a lot to the table. It's easy to get caught up in the "WHAP! And then he hits this guy here!" without noticing everything Madden said leading up to that about why a coverage worked, why a play broke down, etc. He's his own worst enemy in terms of self-promotion. Bill Walton is Madden without the insight or the genial demeanor. All you people who can't take a couple of hours of Madden on Sunday would collapse when the Celtics play 3 games in a week. Madden is Tommy Heinson on Ketamine.
posted by yerfatma at 04:39 PM on November 11, 2003
Whoops, sorry Adam. That should be "replaced". okay, I'll shut up now.
posted by forksclovetofu at 04:47 PM on November 11, 2003
Bravo! Keep 'em coming clove! Madden fumbles his words sometimes (ok, you can almost set your watch to his misses), but he'll always be, sniff sniff, special for teaching me to watch the linemen at the line of scrimmage. When you're a kid and your pops don't know jack about football, he's good to have in the room on Sunday.
posted by garfield at 05:11 PM on November 11, 2003
You have to respect John Madden. He was the sole reason why the Thornton line was shut down in last year's playoff series against the Devils. Urrr... Sorry wrong thread. For the record, put in me in as a Madden (NFL) supporter. Having never played except for pickup games, I watch football at a fourth-grade level, and look forward to both John's simple pointers and inane comments. Except the ass-sweat stuff. That's got to go. Dear God in heaven, John , why are you circling the sweatmarks on that guy's ass and then expounding upon it?
posted by Samsonov14 at 05:23 PM on November 11, 2003
I have come to like Madden. What do I know? I liked Dennis Miller. The fact of the matter is if you have good MNF games then you will tend to like the crew and if the games suck you won't remember them or tend to dislike them. I consider myself knowledgeable, but this year I have noticed that Madden always teaches me something every game. There were two times yesterday where I said, "That's a good point!" to something he said. One I don't remember, but one was when he excoriated one of the fullbacks (might have been Pooper Davenport) for running out of bounds. He said something like "If you carry the ball 30 times then maybe you run out of bounds but a fullback who carries 5 times better turn upfield before he hits the sidelines...". A simple point, maybe, but a good one nonetheless. I tend to enjoy games on my own terms, paying little attention to the crew unless it's somebody fabulous like the Sonics Kevin Calabro. So all I need is for the crew to make a couple good points per game, teach me a thing or two, and Madden does that reasonably well.
posted by vito90 at 05:35 PM on November 11, 2003
One more thing. I LOVE Madden's enthusiasm. It never, ever wears off as far as I'm concerned. Kind of like forksclovetofu's posting. Keep it up, bro.
posted by vito90 at 05:39 PM on November 11, 2003
I prefer the Mad TV sketches to the real thing.
posted by billsaysthis at 06:37 PM on November 11, 2003
Not super familiar with Madden, besides the general pop culture stuff... but... would you compare Madden to the likes of Tim McCarver? Are we talking THAT kind of annoying?
posted by jerseygirl at 07:11 PM on November 11, 2003
I don't mind Madden, and Tim McCarver is one of my least favorite, but neither has anything on the local L.A. Fox Sports station. It features what has to be the most annoying man on TV: Van Earl Wright. I know I'm not alone in my sentiment: Should you be fortunate enough to live outside the reaches of the cruel Fox Sports nexus, Van Earl Wright is an amalgam of hair-spray and suits from Botany 500 intended to pass for a sportscaster. He blurts out scores, news and injury reports in a rhythmic cadence, occasionally barking or rolling his r's for added emphasis. He may also be -- and there's just no polite way to say this -- the worst sports anchor in the English-speaking world. I mean, I'm sure there's some guy in Cuba or somewhere who just really sets people's teeth on edge when he's running through the jai alai footage. But if we restrict ourselves to the Western World, well, Van Earl laps the field.
I can't watch ten seconds without wanting to commit hara-kiri with a dull kitchen knife. The linked article has a compelling theory to explain when and why sports news became so bad.
posted by dusted at 08:19 PM on November 11, 2003
Who's more annoying? Well, it is Billy Walton and those tye dyed t-shirts.
posted by jasonspaceman at 08:44 PM on November 11, 2003
After reading his book, I could never, ever hate the guy. The NFL in the '70s (frankly, it's glory years) belong to the Steelers, Cowboy Cheerleaders, the 1,972 dolphins, Billy "White Shoes" Johnson, and John Madden.
posted by NoMich at 10:22 PM on November 11, 2003
Mich, I thought your comma was a typo until I clicked in. Funny funny! Anybody got a video of Billy doing the dance?
posted by forksclovetofu at 10:58 PM on November 11, 2003
I'd compare Madden to McCarver... someone who lost it a few years ago that used to be good. I can't think of an exact example but in teh Packer-Eagle game he struck me as not only off his rocker and weird (goofy and mis-speaking) but just plain WRONG about some calls, like where he kept insisting "I'd kick the field goal here" over and over when it was pretty obvious that that was the wrong move. I think a punt situation had similar argument. Over and over. The thing he does that annoys me most though is just the stating the obvious. Way too many links in that first post - it disrupts my reading. (Looks like an endquote entry :) ) How much time does it take to put that all together?
posted by Bernreuther at 11:15 AM on November 12, 2003
Whether you really love him, really really really hate him or just need to take your medication; everybody has an opinion about venerable sportscaster John Madden. Though his work as an announcer has certainly seen better days(QT req.), everyone knows it’s simply not football without Madden. A high Q rating comes at a price for John; history is less likely to remember him as a coach and more as the cultural icon who brought us the turducken, numerous ill-advised advertising campaigns and the video game juggernaut (reg. required, but _fascinating_ article inside) that is his EA Sports series; to say nothing of the much noted Madden Curse, fresh off another victim (Well, Adalius Thomas helped a little...). What a shame if the Madden legend is reduced to this handful of dust.
Let’s not let it happen! To honor the man's, er, natural gifts I propose we offer JM a lasting honorific. But what is an appropriate monument for this sports giant?
Well, more than anything else, Madden is ANNOYING. More annoying than David Arquette, Fran Drescher, Clay Aiken, even Hitler. So I’m suggesting that with JM as a standard, we create a new unit of measurement: the Madden, to gauge just how annoying a person or situation is. Under this system, Carrot Top would be worth approximately 1.08 Maddens, Bill Walton would be about one-quarter of a Madden (say, that doesn't sound right...), and Spam would be 121.243 Maddens maddening. Heck it’s a lot nicer than what columnist Dan Savage did to Senator Rick Santorum, but no less appropriate.
How Maddened can you get?